Sending Free Texts Via Gmail

Gmail, the email service of Internet giant Google has added free Short Messaging System (SMS) or text messaging to its system. If you have an email account with Gmail and you want to send a text message to anyone with mobile service subscription in different countries around the world (see countries and list of supported mobile operators on this link) for free, all you have to do is login to your account, enter the cellphone number (use country code instead of “0”) of the party you want to contact in the “Send SMS” box, press “Enter”, type the Contact Name then “Save” and a typical chat box will open.

If you start using the free SMS message sending in a Gmail chat, you will be granted with initial quota of fifty (50) messages and every time a message is sent the quota decreases by one. When a phone user replies to your Gmail SMS message your quota increases by five (5) up to a maximum of 50. If your quota goes down to zero at any point, it will increase back up to one after twenty-four (24) hours. Also, when you need a higher message quota, you can always send a text message to your own phone, and then reply to it multiple times. Every time you send a reply message, your quota is increased by 5 so effectively you are saving money (5 messages for PhP1.00) when you use the Gmail SMS.

If you are working or living abroad, you can send free Gmail SMS messages to any Smart, Globe and Sun Cellular subscriber in the Philippines and if he replies, one (PhP1.00) peso will be charged to his account per text message with maximum 160 characters. When I learned about this free service in Gmail, the Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) were the first to come to my mind. An OFW with Gmail account and access to the Internet will definitely benefit if they use this free texting service in communicating with the loved ones he left in the country.